


Until We Die

by Higgles123



Category: The Take (TV)
Genre: Drug Use, F/M, Smut, Swearing, domestic abuse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-16
Updated: 2020-06-16
Packaged: 2021-03-04 07:29:11
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,184
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24749899
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Higgles123/pseuds/Higgles123
Summary: I'm obsessed with Freddie. I know he's vile but I can't help it. This rather long one shot delves in Freddie's past and I don't really know how or where this all came from but it did.
Relationships: Freddie Jackson/Original Female Character(s)
Kudos: 10





	Until We Die

It was raining. Not that Kimberley Ryan cared. The cold and damp was preferable to going home and waiting to have another round of her father’s fists raining blow after blow down on her. She leaned her head back against the wall of the bridge she sat beneath, listening to the rhythmic drip drop of the rain splattering onto the floor beside her. A stray drop fell upon her forehead, travelling down her face and her tongue darted out to catch it. 

  
“If you’re thirsty I’ll buy you a drink you know.” 

  
Kimberley smiled. She didn’t need to open her eyes because she would recognise that voice anywhere. She had been expecting it in fact. Freddie Jackson. Her best friend of the last seventeen years. You see, this was what they did. Every single night. Kimberley would walk out of the front door at almost as the ten o’clock news started, while her mother sat on the sofa staring at the screen, pretending she was happy living in a shitty council house with a husband who would be home to beat the shit out of her on his return from the pub. In the Jackson household, Freddie’s mother would be sat doing exactly the same. And just like in the Jackson household, Kimberley had been getting slapped around for as long as she could remember. She often thought that was why she and Freddie were meant to be together, because they were essentially two halves of one whole.

“What have you got for me, Freddie?” Kimberley opened her eyes when he sat down and his arm brushed against hers.

“Nice to see you too, Kimmie,” he chuckled, chewing loudly on his chewing gum. He pulled a small plastic bag out of his pocket and dangled it in front of Kim’s face. She reached out to grab it and he yanked it away quickly. “Ah, ah. Not until I get somethin’ from you.”

Kim rolled her eyes playfully before cupping Freddie’s face to kiss him. He tasted like beer and cannabis; he tasted comforting. Her Freddie. His tongue darted inside her mouth as he pulled her up onto his lap and she almost choked as his chewing gum fell down her throat. She swallowed it with a grunt as Freddie smiled against her lips, his hardening cock grinding against her centre. He groaned and she knew what he wanted. She wanted it to because it was the only thing that helped apart from the drugs. The floor was damp on her back as Freddie lay her down, yanking at her trousers and underwear; his fingers knowing exactly what to do to draw the sounds from her that he loved. He eased himself inside of her just as her walls began to clench, and he paused for a moment gritting his teeth to stop himself from spilling his load.

“Freddie,” she moaned, her hands sliding beneath his shirt and jacket to claw at his back. “Fuck.”

“I know babe,” he grunted, moving deliciously in and out of her. “Fuckin’ thought about this all day, didn’t I? Shiftin’ them fuckin’ bricks about on that buildin’ site was a right waste of my fuckin’ time, but keeps me outta the nick for now if I can show the probation officer what an honourable citizen I am… ah fuck, your cunt is so tight babe… was made for me, weren’t it?”

“Freddie please,” Kim begged, as he bent his head to nibble at her neck while his hand wandered to fondle her breast through her top.

“Don’t you worry,” he murmured. “Freddie knows what you need, don’t I?”

His hand moved to rub slow circles around her clit while his thrusts became deeper and more measured until the pair of them reached their peaks simultaneously. Kimberley’s eyes were closed and she could do nothing but lie with Freddie’s weight on top of her as the aftershocks of her orgasm died down, leaving her feeling weak in the best way. She felt Freddie’s thumb and forefinger pushing into her mouth and she shivered at the acidic taste of the tablet he pressed against her tongue.

“Mm,” she hummed, swallowing the tablet before kissing Freddie softly as he swallowed his own.

“I love you, Kim,” he said quietly, looking into her eyes as he ran his fingers across her face, his finger doing a dot to dot on her freckled nose. 

“I love you too, Freddie,” she murmured, feeling the affects of whatever Freddie had given her already.

“One day, we won’t have to do this,” his lips brushed against her forehead before he sat up and lit himself a spliff.

Yanking up her trousers, Kimberley sat up and wrapped her arms around him, grinning when he held the joint to her lips, keeping it there while she took a drag. Exhaling contentedly, Kim lay her head on Freddie’s shoulder and closed her eyes.

“One day I’m gonna take you far away from all this shit,” Freddie wrapped his arm around her and pulled her close against him as he blew smoke rings into the night sky. “You’ll never have to work to make extra money like our mums do. You can sit and watch Brookside all day and paint your nails. Gonna buy you us a massive house fit for a queen cos that’s what you deserve.”

“I don’t need all of those things, Freddie. I just need you.”

“Yeah well you’ve got me forever, aint ya,” he said, taking hold of her hand which rested on his knee. His forefinger followed the faint silver scar on the palm of her hand and he held up his own which held an identical mark. “We might have just been kids when we mixed blood and promised to always look after each other, but I meant every word of it. You and me, Kim… until we die.”

…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………

Kim waited. She waited hours for him to come. She waited for him to come and bring something to make her forget the day she’d had; the day that had seen her father lose his temper over dinner and punch his only daughter in the face. And then because that wasn’t enough, he had dragged her by the hair and forced her face into the sink full of water until she almost passed out. And then because that still wasn’t enough, he let her drop to the floor like a sack of potatoes before kicking and punching her repeatedly until he was tired and sweating from his exertion. All the while, her mother had sat there staring at her pie and chips on her plate as though she might find the answer to life’s great mysteries written in the drizzled slop of ready made gravy.

Under the bridge, clutching her ribs and tentatively licking at her split lip Kim let tears of self pity roll down her bruised face. She wanted Freddie. She _needed_ Freddie. He would come. Of course he would come because Freddie would never ever let her down.

One hour. Two hours. It was nearing two o’clock in the morning and she was still sat alone, waiting and hoping for him to appear. His absence hurt her more than her father’s hands ever could yet it made her feel numb at the same time. Well, fuck him. She only really wanted him for the gear he provided anyway. At least that’s what she told herself; convinced herself. She knew where to go to find what she needed. Everyone on the estate knew where to go. She had never needed to before because Freddie always made sure he got her the best quality stuff. Always said he didn’t want her having no crap that would make her sick, but she didn’t care right now. She didn’t care what she got or how she got it.

…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………

“Look at the fucking state of this out here, Freddie.”

Freddie looked up from the money he was counting. He had made three hundred pounds tonight alone from selling smack, and he smiled to himself as he tucked it inside his jacket pocket for safe keeping. Just a bit more money for him and Kim when they finally left this shit hole. Kim flashed through his mind along with a pang of guilt, but he quickly pushed away the image of her waiting for him under the bridge. She would understand when he explained to her tomorrow that he had been offered an opportunity that would open doors to help him make more money for them. She would understand because he did it for her, for them.

His heart warmed when he thought about her padding barefoot around their massive house, wearing designer clothes and smiling when he walked through the door. Freddie didn’t know how it was possible for someone like him to love another human being as much as he loved her. He loved his mother of course, fucking doted on the woman who had always given him a beaming smile despite nursing bruises or marks that were anything but happy, but the love he felt for Kim was different. Well, of course it was cos he didn’t go round fucking his mother, did he? Kim was more than just someone to fuck or someone to do a bit of smack with. She was his best friend in every way. She knew him probably better than he knew himself. Kim could curb his temper with one gentle touch and she made him want to be more than what his old man constantly told him he would be. Because of Kim- for Kim- he _would_ be more than just another fuck up. Zipping up his leather jacket, Freddie headed to the doorway of the pub to see what had the attention of the bloke he had been working with all night.

“Kim!” he yelled, dropping to his knees the second the limp body came into view. “Kim, babe, can you hear me?”

He pulled her raven hair out of her face and grimaced at the vomit matted there. It was dribbling out of her mouth and without thinking Freddie shoved his fingers in there to make sure she hadn’t choked. Kim barely reacted and Freddie found himself slapping at her pale face desperately.

“Kim, come on,” he begged before turning abruptly to the man behind him. “Go inside and phone an ambulance for fucks sakes.”

“Do you know her, Freddie?”

“Just go and phone an ambulance right now!”

The man disappeared into the empty pub and Freddie was shaking Kim, watching with horror as her eyes rolled to the back of her head when she tried to open them.

“Babe,” he cried, his voice cracking as fear like nothing he had ever known radiated through every fibre of his being. “Kimmie, come on. Please babe, please wake up. What have you taken? Kim! Kimmie tell me what you’ve fuckin’ taken! Babe, I love you, come on.”

“You weren’t there, Freddie,” she mumbled.

“I’m sorry baby,” Freddie didn’t realise he was crying until he felt the wet upon his cheeks. “I’m here now and I need you to stay with me, Kim, don’t I? Me and you forever, yeah? Now just open them eyes and stay with me. We’re gonna get you to the hospital and you’re gonna be alright.”

“I’m sorry,” she muttered.

“No, I’m sorry babe. Just keep talkin’ to me alright. What did you take babe? Do you know?”

“I just wanted it to stop, Freddie,” she whispered.

And that was when he saw them. The cuts and bruises on her face. He had let her down in a way that he’d promised her he never would. But he knew he would spend the rest of his life making it up to her. Never again would he watch her lying in a pool of her own vomit because he hadn’t been there when she needed him the most.

“I’m gonna fix you, babe, I promise.”

…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………

_Four years later_

“Why didn’t you come and visit?”

Freddie lay on the tatty leather sofa and blew smoke rings up into the air. Across the room, Kim was watching him with that sad look in her eyes. He knew that look because it was the same look his mother had when she came to see him in the slammer. Disappointment and sadness all mixed into one. But _she_ , his Kim, was the person he never wanted to look at him like that.

“You know why, Freddie,” she answered.

“Actually, no I don’t know, Kimberley,” he glared. “So why don’t you come over here and tell me why the fuck in seven months you didn’t step foot inside that prison once to visit me.”

“I couldn’t.”

“You couldn’t?” he stood up angrily. “You couldn’t or you fuckin’ wouldn’t?”

Kimberley said nothing as Freddie leaned over her menacingly, his eyes blazing with fury that was directed solely at her. He grabbed her face, squeezing and still she did nothing. She didn’t cry out in pain, she just stared at him with those sad fucking eyes.

“Answer me!” he screamed, letting go of her and punching the wall above her head. “Fuckin’ answer me. I was only in there cos of you! You’ve fuckin’ done this to me! You! You’ve turned me into this fuckin’ animal and you sit there lookin’ at me like you’re disappointed in me when it’s all your fuckin’ fault.”

He looked down to see the chair empty. She was already half way out the door.

“Kim wait,” his voice cracked. “Babe please don’t go. Please don’t leave me, I’m beggin’ you. I just fuckin’ love you so much and I need you, Kim. I need you.”

“I’m here, Freddie,” she murmured, wrapping her arms around him, bringing him peace instantly.

They held each other like that for minutes or maybe even hours; neither was keeping track of the time. She smelled like strawberry shampoo and parma violets and he breathed her in until he was calm once more.

“I’m sorry I couldn’t come and visit you, Freds,” she looked up at him and touched his face gently. “You know I would have if I could. I missed you so much.”

“I know babe,” he nodded, letting out all of the tension he possessed in one long exhalation. “I just don’t feel like myself when you’re not around and it scares me.”

“Well I’m around now,” Kim reassured him. “Now why don’t you get some sleep, hmm?”

“Only if you promise you’ll stay with me,” Freddie looked into her eyes pleadingly. “Even after I’m asleep.”

“I promise, Freddie.”

…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………

The television was on but Freddie wasn’t really paying attention. He was flicking through the channels aimlessly, banging the remote on the side of the armchair every few minutes because the batteries were staring to give up the ghost. His daughter, Kim, was asleep on the sofa opposite him and Freddie looked over at her and smiled. Standing up, he scooped her up gently and carried her to her bedroom, kissing her on the cheek as he pulled up her Minnie mouse duvet and tucked her in.

“She’s beautiful, isn’t she?”

Freddie turned around to find Kim standing in the doorway watching him with such tenderness and love. He reached out for her and pulled her into his arms, kissing the top of her head.

“I wish she was ours,” he murmured, lifting her face so he could kiss her lips.

“Don’t Freddie,” Kim sighed. “You’re with Jackie now and you’ve got a beautiful daughter and another on the way.”

“And I’d give it all up to be with you.”

Kim sighed and ducked out from underneath Freddie’s arms to pad down the hallway towards the living room. She passed Freddie’s bedroom along the way and caught sight of a heavily pregnant, Jackie fast asleep in the bed she shared with her husband.

“Kim,” Freddie hissed. “Don’t fuckin’ walk away from me.”

“Look at her, Freddie,” Kim murmured.

“Don’t fuckin’ wanna,” Freddie scowled.

“Freddie, please,” Kim took his hand and squeezed. “Look at your wife; the woman who’s about to give you your second child. She loves you, Freddie.”

“Well I don’t love her,” Freddie turned to look at Kim. “You’re the one I love, Kim. You’re the only woman I’ll ever love and I hate myself for gettin’ saddled with that fuckin’ dirty trollop in there because it means I can’t be with you.”

“You can’t be with me anyway, Freddie,” Kim answered sadly. “You and me were never meant to be together.”

“No,” Freddie shook his head. “Don’t you fuckin’ say that. We were meant to be together forever and she’s taken that from us.”

“You can’t blame Jackie for that.”

“I can and I fuckin’ will.”

“Freddie-“

“-Don’t fuckin’ Freddie me,” he spat, pushing her against the wall and shoving his face against hers angrily. “I don’t want Jackie, I want you. I fuckin’ want you.”

“There’s only one way that can happen,” Kim sighed. “You and me both know that.”

…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………

Jackie was crying. The girls were crying. Freddie didn’t even have it in him to give a shit. Roxie was too young to fully understand but his little Kimmie knew; Freddie could see it in her eyes. She was looking at him the way he used to look at his old man. She was looking at him like he was a monster. And he was. He fucking was. He had smacked Jackie; he had punched his pregnant wife in the face because he was a fucking monster. And what was worse was that he didn’t even feel sorry about it.

Before he even realised it, he was slamming the front door closed behind him as his feet moved of their own volition. He heard nothing but the roaring in his ears and the pounding of his adrenaline in his chest. His jaw was clenched so tight that he felt one of his back teeth crack, but still he didn’t care. He just wanted her. He _needed_ her. He lit himself a cigarette and sniffed a line of coke and then he sat underneath that bridge and waited for her to come. His eyes were closed but he knew when she sat down beside him because he felt her calming presence envelope him.

“I didn’t mean to hit her,” he murmured. “She just wouldn’t stop gettin’ in my face, and when she said I was like my old man I just fuckin’ lost it.”

“And then you went and did something that proved her point,” Kim replied. “Day by day you’re becoming more and more like him, Freddie.”

“No,” he squeezed his eyes tighter shut in anguish. “I am _nothin’_ like that fuckin’ bastard and you know it.”

“I’m not sure I do,” Kim’s eyes filled with tears as she looked at him. “I don’t think I know who you are anymore because you’re not my Freddie.”

“I am your Freddie,” he opened his own eyes to look at hers. “I’m the same Freddiethat has sat under this bridge with you for years and years.”

“You’re not,” she whispered, her bottom lip trembling as tears rolled down her cheeks. “I want my Freddie back, not this monster.”

“Babe,” he sighed, pressing his forehead against hers and closing his eyes to regain his composure. “When I’m not with you that Freddie don’t exist. I try to be a better person around the girls but it just don’t work. Do you not understand that I don’t feel any peace unless I’m with you?”

“Freddie, we can’t keep doing this. You can’t keep using me as an escape from your life. We had our chance and we blew it. _I_ blew it.”

“No,” Freddie shook his head. “Nothin’ that happened was your fault, it was mine. I shoulda been there for you and I weren’t. But I would give anythin’ to make it all right again and be with you like we planned.”

“Me too, Freddie,” Kim leaned her head upon his shoulder. “Me too.”

…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………

Freddie became a father for the third time. He finally got the boy he had always wanted but for some reason the birth of his son felt hollow. The girls were besotted with their new brother and Freddie had been trying his hardest to make things work with Jackie; not because he wanted to but because he had promised Kim. He still saw her most nights; he couldn’t be without her even if he tried, but she was growing distant as the months passed. Her visits were shorter and she continued to pull away from him because she wanted him to focus on his young family. She wanted him to give his children the life she and him never had growing up, and as much as it killed him he would do it for her. Well, he would try anyway.

It was a Thursday night and Jackie had gone to the bingo with her sister, leaving Freddie alone with all three kids. He had tucked the girls up in their beds with a video on and he held baby Freddie against his chest while he listened to the radio, breathing in the little boy’s baby scent and feeling his steady breathing rise and fall. He wished Kim would come but it had been days since he had last seen her, and it was eating him alive. He closed his eyes and let his mind wander.

_“What the fuck is that on your face?” Freddie frowned as he sat down on the swing beside hers._

_“Make up,” she answered with a casual shrug. “Do you not like it?”_

_Freddie looked at her properly for a moment before answering. It didn’t look bad if truth be told, but it was very different. He had never noticed how full her lips were before or that her eyes were ever so slightly different shades of hazel-brown if you looked closely. Freddie had kissed quite a few girls at the grand old age of fourteen, but he had never entertained the thought of kissing Kim before. Until now._

_“Looks good, Kimmie,” he spoke finally, standing up and walking behind Kim. He leaned over her and when she looked up to smile at him he took the chance and pressed his lips to hers. He half expected her to smack him in the face when he pulled away and sat back down on the adjacent swing, but instead she just looked at him in confusion. Her face broke out into a smile and she pressed her fingers to her lips as a blush spread across her face._

“Daddy! Daddy!”

Freddie opened his eyes with a jolt, and hurriedly placed little Freddie in the second hand moses basket beside the radiator, and took off running to the girls’ room where it sounded like world war three was beginning.

“Daddy, I was looking at your special box from your wardrobe and Kim came and tried to snatch it off me and then she smacked me,” Roxie cried.

“She smacked me first!” Kim exclaimed, her face red with anger. “I was only trying to take the box because we’re not supposed to touch it, isn’t that right?”

“But I only wanted to look, Daddy! And now Kimmie’s gone and ripped this.”

Freddie eyes fell upon the photograph in Roxie’s small hand and his heart felt like it had been torn in two along with the picture.

“Get into bed,” he spat, trying to control his rage as he snatched the fragmented pieces from his youngest daughter. “I mean it. Right now.

“But Daddy, I-“

“- Get into fuckin’ bed now before I smack you so hard you won’t be able to sit down for a week!” he roared, his face shaking with rage and spit flying across the room. “You little fuckin’ animals!”

“Freddie! What the fuck is going on!” Jackie appeared as if by magic, Maggie stood behind her with a look of utter shock and disgust on her face.

“I’ll tell you what the fuck is goin’ on, shall I?” Freddie screamed into Jackie’s face, grabbing her roughly by the arm while the girls cried in their beds and looked to their aunt Maggie desperately. “These little cows thought it was alright to touch what belonged to me when they had no fuckin’ right to have their grubby paws on it.”

“Freddie they’re fuckin’ children,” Jackie rolled her eyes.

“I don’t give a fuck!” Freddie sneered, shoving the torn picture right underneath Jackie’s nose with a growl. “Look what they’ve fuckin’ done.”

“Oh so they’ve torn up a picture of the fuckin’ slut that’s driven a wedge between us for our entire marriage?” Jackie chortled darkly. “However will you cope, Freddie?”

“You’re a vicious little bitch,” Freddie’s eyes glowered and he grabbed Jackie by the throat, squeezing with all of his might even as the girls screamed and Maggie tried to prize his hand away from her sister’s throat. “I fuckin’ hate your guts and for as long as I live, I’ll wish it was her I was with and not you.”

Finally Maggie managed to pull Freddie from Jackie, who clutched her throat as she tried to catch her breath. Freddie stared at her, his nostrils flaring like a bull waiting to attack and Jackie couldn’t help it. She would goad him because she loved to get a reaction out of him; because she wanted him to love her like she loved Kim.

“You’re pathetic, Freddie,” she snarled. “Kim’s dead and she’s never coming back. Especially not for the likes of you.”

Smirking with satisfaction, Jackie allowed Maggie to lead her and the girls into the living room while Freddie screamed and bawled and kicked and punched and destroyed everything in his path. She was glad to hear that his heart as much as hers because he deserved it. He grieved and mourned over a dead girl while she grieved and mourned a husband who was very much alive in body but long gone in his soul. Freddie dropped to his knees, crying out like a wounded animal as he squeezed his eyes shut and smacked himself in the head repeatedly to force the image from his mind.

_She didn’t look right. That was Freddie’s first thought. He had never seen a dead body before, and as he stood in the funeral director’s looking down at the person he loved most in the world, all he could think about was how she didn’t look quite right. She looked peaceful, almost like she was sleeping except he had slept beside her too many times to know that when she was in a deep sleep, her forehead would furrow and she would pout her lips like she was waiting for Prince Charming to kiss her awake. But now her lips were closed and in a straight line that looked almost unnatural. And her hair. Freddie shook his head and felt inexplicable anger wash over him. That wasn’t how she had her hair; she always had her fringe brushed over to one side. With shaking his hands he fixed it, trying not to think about how cold her body was to touch. She had never been cold before; she was always warm. His very own personal heater._

_“Kim,” he whispered, tears dripping down his face. “I was meant to fix you, babe. You weren’t supposed to leave me. I know I wasn’t there but you never gave me the chance to make it right.”_

_Bile rose in his throat as he thought about the moment he had watched her life slip away as he held her in his arms. It was nothing like you see in the films; no great big dramatic exhalation of air or heartfelt declarations of love. It was just so simple, so quick. One minute she was breathing and then the next she wasn’t. The ambulance came and tried to wrestle her body from Freddie’s grip while he screamed and begged for her to come back and not leave him. But she didn’t listen. And it was all his fault._

Freddie screamed himself into exhaustion. At some point in the middle of the night, he felt a small body nestle against him on the floor.

“Do you miss her?”

Freddie opened his eyes to find his eldest daughter’s staring back at him.

“Who?”

“Aunty Kim.”

Freddie nodded, swallowing down the lump in his throat. There weren’t enough words in the english language, or any language, to explain just how much he missed her.

“Did you love her more than Mummy?”

Freddie didn’t answer, but he could see from the look in Kim’s face that his silence had been answer enough. When did his little girl become so grown up? He was so lost in grief and self destruction that his baby girl had become a little adult right before his eyes.

“Did you call me Kim because you wish I was her?”

“No babe,” Freddie sighed, pulling her little body even tighter against him and kissing the top of her head. “I called you Kim because when I first saw you in that hospital, my heart didn’t hurt as much anymore. I called you Kim because every time I looked at you, I wanted to remember her and I wanted to remind myself to do all the things for you that I couldn’t do for her.”

“Like what, Daddy?” Kim asked.

“Like buy you a great big house and give you everything you could ever want,” he answered. “All the toys you want and when you’re big you’d never have to go to work because I would make sure you’ve got all you need.

“But Daddy,” Kim touched his cheek. “I don’t want lots of toys… but I do want you to take me to the park after school and take me to the cinema club on Saturday morning. Lexie Draper from school goes with her dad every Saturday even though he hates her mum and they fight like you and mummy do.”

A tear trickled down Freddie’s cheek and he took Kim’s little hand and kissed it.

“I’ll take you baby, I promise,” he whispered.

He would leave Jackie; he knew it would never work between them because his heart always had and always would belong to the one woman he could never have. But he would make sure his kids were well provided for because it was the least they deserved and it was what Kim expected of him. He realised that now you see. She didn’t come anymore because it was time to let her go. It was time to focus on what was in front of him; on his kids. He needed to stop living in the past and live for the future.

“I love you, Kim,” he whispered, looking out of the bedroom window from where he lay. He looked at the stars and knew she was there waiting for him.

He would find her again one day and live the life they were meant to, but until then she would live in his heart forever.


End file.
